Ensalada Caprese
by Chainlinks
Summary: A set of unconnected ficlets starring the incredibly oblivious Spain and his grumpy sidekick and occasional boyfriend , Romano.
1. Morning After

**Author's Note: **I asked a friend of mine to give me "a couple" of prompts to get the hang of writing Spain/Romano. He gave me two hundred. Ever obliging, I wrote him two hundred one-sentence stories based on those prompts. Some of those one-sentence stories were just begging to be expanded into ficlets, however, and that's what you'll find here.

*

**1. Boxers**

Romano hadn't meant to spend the night. He'd just meant to run over and pick up a few papers. If he'd timed his visit to the exact time that Spain always made dinner and then demanded that he be served too, well that was Spain's fault. He knew how Romano felt about tomatoes.

Dinner had led to an argument (well, Romano had argued while Spain had just smiled and laughed at him), and the argument led to watching a movie on Spain's couch and by the time the movie was over, it was really too late to go home, or so Spain had claimed with a predatory grin as he'd led Romano upstairs to the bedroom.

Now it was morning. Romano got up first because it was next to impossible to get up after Spain, with how late he always slept. The sun was bright and warm and peeking through the blinds, though, and it was definitely time to wake up. Romano looked around. He wasn't entirely sure where his clothes were. He remembered something about his shirt getting lost out the window, but his pants had to be... There they were. Hooked over the ceiling fan.

Romano stood below the fan and reached up on his tip-toes. His fingertips brushed the bottom hem of the pants, but he couldn't quite reach. He looked around, but there was nothing to climb on.

He turned on the fan.

He quickly turned the fan off as the pants would their way around the base of the fan, looking hopelessly stuck.

Those pants were out of the question, then. Romano ruffled through Spain's drawers, searching for some boxers. After going through two drawers of shirts and one drawer of questionable things he hoped to never lay eyes on again, he found Spain's underwear drawer and stole the pair on top. Ha. It would serve Spain right, Romano though viciously as he slipped the boxers on. Spain would know not to mess with him from now on, else he get his boxers stolen.

Feeling smugly victorious, Romano crossed to the bathroom, throwing a stray hanger at Spain just out of spite.

***

Spain woke up when a hanger bounced off of his forehead. He stared at it uncomprehendingly before rolling over, arm moving out to pulling Romano snug against his chest. His hand hit air, then cold mattress. Spain blinked his eyes open blearily. Where was... He stumbled to his feet, following the sounds of tapwater coming from the bathroom.

He was met with the sight of Romano, hair mussed and shirtless, brushing his teeth. It wasn't an inherently sexy sight, but Spain was prepared to comment on how cute Romano looked when he saw the boxers. He recognized those boxers, with their strategically placed Spanish flag. Spain's eyes remained glued to that Spanish flag as a blush spread over his cheeks, brighter red than even Romano usually managed.

He closed his mouth and made a hasty retreat towards the bed. It was too early for this.


	2. Something New

**2. Bother**

The first week of their relationship was awkward. It was mostly Romano's fault to be honest. He was used to treating Spain like... well. Not like one would usually treat a significant other. In their first week, Romano fluctuated between being alarmingly charming because he thought he had to be, and even grumpier than usual, resenting Spain over the fact that he felt like he had to be charming even though Spain liked him just fine when he wasn't.

It all came to a head the first time they went out to dinner and Romano stared at the chair Spain had just sat down in. "I was going to pull that out for you, idiot," Romano snapped, slouching in his own seat.

Spain smiled, finally finding a way to fix things. "You don't have to, though," he said. "I'm not looking for you to be someone other than the stubborn little Romano you've been for as long as I've known you."

"Hmph," Romano replied, crossing his arms and looking away.

During the second week of their relationship, things improved remarkably. Romano stopped putting on that wide, charming smile and started sharing his rare, smirky-but-genuine smiles with Spain again and Spain... For all of Spain's usual obliviousness, he caught on fairly quickly to the fact that a snappish "Don't bother me!", furrowed eyebrows, and a subtle tilt of the head that exposed his neck was just Romano's way of telling Spain to kiss him.


	3. Home Late

**3. Book**

It had been a long day, and not the exciting kind that left you flooded with exhausted panic and buzzing anxiety, but the slow kind of long where every moment of tediousness grated your nerves until they were rubbed raw. Imports and exports and that stupid potato bastard.

Romano toed off his shoes and lost his shirt somewhere in the hallway. One sock was dropped outside the kitchen, which was the first place he checked for Spain, not just because it was the closest in proximity to the front door but also because he wanted a snack. He wasn't sure where the other sock had gotten off to, but by the time he made it to the stairs, it was definitely missing in action.

By the time he reached Spain's bedroom, he'd lost everything but his pants, which he fully planned on flinging across his bedroom floor before passing out for as long as it took for the tenseness to leak out of his muscles. First though, he had to tell Spain goodnight and make sure the idiot didn't decide to interrupt his sleep for some reason. Not like that would actually happen, since Spain prized sleep more than anyone, which meant Romano was really just going to tell Spain goodnight, but there was no reason why he should admit that.

Romano flung open the door to Spain's bedroom unceremoniously. "I home and I'm going to bed," he announced.

"Mm," Spain replied distractedly, drawing Romano's eyes to his form, sprawled across the rumpled bed. He was stretched out, limbs haphazardly twisted in the sheets, shirt unbuttoned, hair mussed. All of this was perfectly normal and ordinary. Even the paperwork that was spread carelessly in front of him wasn't that uncommon.

But. But.

The gold wire lenses perched on the bridge of his nose. Those were definitely new.

Reading glasses, Romano realized as he approached the bed. Spain wore reading glasses. That was the last coherent thought he had until he woke up the next morning, even more sore than he had been the night before, still tired, and incredibly late for his afternoon meeting.


	4. Wearing Steam And A Smile

**4. Naked**

The first thing that Romano noticed when he left the kitchen was the copious amounts of steam pouring from the bathroom. "Stupid Spaniard is going to use up all the hot water," Romano mumbled, determined not to admit that he was glad Spain was taking care of himself. Spain didn't do that nearly enough.

"Lovi~" Spain's voice called out. "Is that you?"

"Who else would it be, idiot?" Romano demanded.

"Can you hand me my towel? I know I grabbed one, but I think I left it on the chair in the hallway," Spain said. "It's green," he added helpfully.

Romano sighed as if Spain had just asked him to turn the moon into a giant tomato, but he spotted the towel right where Spain had said it was. He picked it up and entered the bathroom, blinking past the wall of steam. Out of the thick, wet air came Spain's hand, reaching blindly for the towel and managing to smack Romano twice in the face before successfully grabbing hold. By this time, the steam had cleared and Romano was able to see Spain a little more clearly as the taller nation began drying his hair with the towel.

Against his will, Romano felt his eyes dragged down the paths that the dripping hot water was taking, tracing wet paths over the muscles of Spain's abdomen, skirting over Spain's hip bone, down his thigh and inwards...

"Are you alright?" Spain asked worriedly, snapping Romano out of his hypnotic state.

"Wh-what?" Romano asked, eyes jerking up to meet Spain's.

Spain took a step forward, slinging the towel over his shoulder instead of around his waist like a normal person would. His hand stretched and touched Romano's forehead, though Romano wasn't sure what the idiot thought he was doing, since there was no way he'd get an accurate temperature reading in the still steaming bathroom.

"What's wrong?" Spain asked.

A droplet of water fell from his hair and crossed the plane of his shoulder, falling into the dip of his collar bone. Romano's eyes traitorously followed it. "I didn't realize you showered so _naked_," he stammers before taking one step back, hitting his back on the door frame, and turning and running.

Spain stared after him, utterly confused and wondering if he'd forgotten to instruct Romano on some important rules of hygiene. He made a step as if to follow Romano, but found himself with a face full of fresh clothes thrown at his head and a door slammed in his face. Now probably wasn't the best time to instruct Romano on the ways of showering. He'd have to show him later, when Romano wasn't being so grumpy and uncute.

Thus resolved, Spain finished toweling off and began to get dressed, completely unaware to the red-faced, wide-eyed Romano sitting slumped on the other side of the door.


	5. Photographic

**5. Photograph**

Spain isn't the type to keep a creepy storage closet of dusty unresolved sexual tension, but he does keep a stack of photo albums on the bottom shelf of a bookshelf. They're all bland monochrome so that the undiscerning eye slides ride over them, but sometimes Spain pulls them out and looks through them when he's feeling particularly nostalgic.

The first book, a dusty cream binder, is filled with carefully preserved paintings of Romano. In every painting, he's frowning and looking like he'd rather be anywhere but posing for a picture in Spain's house. He's wearing his cute maid dress in most of the pictures, but a few of them feature overalls or old trousers. The frown never changes, though.

It's not until the second album, a deep mahogany book of polaroids, that Romano starts cracking smiles, but they're all sarcastic and usually accompanied with an eyeroll. In the third book, the charcoal gray album of digital print-outs, the pictures are all recent but the expression on the grown face hasn't changed. There's still scowling, nonplussed stares, and bitterly sardonic parodies of a genuine smile.

Spain doesn't look through the pictures all that often. It bothers him. He remembers the good times with Romano, the laundry, the tomato picking, the thunderstorm cuddling, but Romano had never let any of that translate to a painting or photograph.

Well.

That wasn't entirely true.

Whenever Spain got bothered by the scowling Romano's in his photo, though, he'd pull out his cell phone and dig through the hundreds of pictures until he found one candid picture of himself with Romano's hand on his shoulder, both of them grinning and laughing. Romano wasn't looking at the camera; he was staring at Spain with unabashed affection, eyes lit up, mouth open and expressive as they shared some private joke in the Italian sun.

Romano still didn't know how to smile for a camera, but over the years he'd learned how to smile for Spain.


	6. Buried Treasure

**6. Pirates**

The door was unlocked, and Romano hardly ever bothered knocking when he visited Spain. After living with the idiot for who-knows-how-long, visiting Spain felt more like coming home than visiting a fellow nation. Familiarity aided Romano as he navigated the darkened home, but it wasn't enough as he banged his knee on a low coffee table.

Damn it, Romano thought, furiously blinking back tears. Damn that stupid Spanish idiot. He knew Romano was coming over! Romano had very loudly scorned Spain's offer of a romantic, candlelight dinner, but he'd done it in a way that Spain _had_ to know by now meant "Okay." Yet here he was in Spain's dark, quiet, candlelight-less and more importantly, dinner-less home.

As his eyes adjusted to the dim, just past sunset light, Romano saw a strip of brightness coming from the crack under one of the doors. Romano frowned. The old storage room? What was the idiot doing in there? Definitely not cleaning.

"Spain!" he yelled. "You promised me dinner, so I'm here! Stop hiding in your closet, or whatever it is you're--"

The door opened. The light inside was bright, and at first all he could see was that brightness, with a blurred silhouette stark against it. His eyes adjusted quickly, though, and what he saw left his mouth dry, a gasp half formed and stifled somewhere in his throat.

Spain stood tall. He was not wearing his homespun, everyday clothes. These were old, expensive clothes made from heavy, shined leathers and delicate silks in exotic colors. Tall, black boots stood proud over the subtle forest green leggings. Above that was the crimson jacket, the real piece de resistance of the outfit. It was tailored precisely to Spain's body, accentuating his lean muscles and flaring fashionably at the waist. Each pocket and buttonhole was adorned with gold thread and winking gemstones. The collar was high and stiff, but was softened by the presence of precisely positioned cream ruffles, held in place by a large gold brooch shaped like a skull with rubies shining from the eyes and silver crossbones behind it, studded with tiny sapphires. On top of Spain's head was an elaborate hat, the same forest green as the leggings, but with bands of gold and red, and enormous black and red feathers branching from the band.

Romano stared. This wasn't the first time he'd seen this outfit, but the look in Spain's eyes couldn't be more different than the previous times he'd seen it worn. This was not a malicious conqueror with his battle axe. This wasn't a beaten fighter with blood sprayed across the vest worn under the jacket. This was Spain, playful, sexy and usually oblivious. However, not even Spain, who didn't realize when France was feeling him up or when Romano was agreeing to date, not even Spain could fail to read the stunned lust in Romano's gaze.

Spain wasted no time in pouncing on the shocked Italian, knocking them both to the ground painfully. Romano scowled as he bumped the knee he'd bruised earlier, but Spain paid his frown no mind, fixing his own smile into a steely line. He couldn't quite conceal the playfulness in his big, green eyes, though, or the upwards twitch at the corners of his mouth. Great, Romano thought, rolling his eyes. So now Spain wanted to play make believe in addition to playing dress up?

Before Romano could ask any questions, however, Spain pinned his arms above his head and leaned down to kiss him gently on the the lips. It wasn't a kiss that was meant to be sexy, as it gave off more of a "Come play with me!" feeling. Romano felt sorry for the idiot and kissed him back, which he figured translated to a "Whatever, but if you bang my knee again, I'll kill you."

"Arrr," Spain said, and Romano wondered how someone who had once been an actual pirate could do such a pitiful pirate impersonation. Romano stared back at Spain nonplussed as Spain rearranged himself so that he was properly straddling Romano's waist. "Arr!" Spain repeated with more enthusiasm. "I've taken you as me captive and will be claiming your booty!"

If Romano had had a hand free, he would have facepalmed.

At that moment, however, Spain leaned down towards Romano and nipped at his earlobe sharply before murmuring in his ear in a dark, deadly tone that made the pit of Romano's stomach drop out in the absolute most delicious way.

"Consider yourself pillaged."

**Author's Note: **I'm seriously considering expanding this one into a full-length fic. Opinions?


End file.
